Presently, high power electronic equipment, especially over 200 W, is susceptible to fire damage caused by electrical shorts. Shorts occur across low voltage power planes and ground on the printed circuit cards within the computer cabinet and cause high currents to ignite the printed circuit boards. It has been observed that the electrical short circuits start as a localized hot spot before burning. Because the localized burning is not self-extinguishing, a fire may cause extensive damage to expensive equipment accompanied by a lengthy down time.
Therefore, it would be desirable to provide a system and a method for identifying hot spots within electronic equipment.